Posted by Nikos | Posted in General | Posted on 19-02-2010-05-2008
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The newest generation netbooks sport a strong enough CPU/GPU combo to handle HD content, but millions of netbooks have a much lighter pairing that needs a little help. This guide will help get you stutter-free HD content on your netbook.
Image from Big Buck Bunny, an open-source HD movie.
Over at the website of magazine PCPro they’ve put together a guide to HD-playback on a netbook. Most netbooks, including nearly every netbook built before the end of 2009, isn’t well suited for HD playback. Despite the hardware limitations however you can, with the proper codec, play HD video on your netbook.
The crux of their setup is a combination of Media Player Classic Home Cinema and CoreCodec’s CoreAVC codec. Media Player Classic is free but CoreAVC will run you $10. We know $10 isn’t free, but we’ve used CoreAVC to help older computers function as media centers without getting crushed by HD-playback and we definitely think it worth $10. Especially when you note the playback time PCPro was squeezing out of their netbook battery with it:
And if you’re concerned what HD playback is going to do your netbook’s battery life, you might just be pleasantly surprised. We took one of the latest Pine Trail netbooks lying around the PC Pro office and with screen brightness set to maximum and 802.11n enabled, found that 90 minutes of looping a 720P trailer only sapped about 25% of our battery. Turn off wireless and drop the brightness a little and you’d probably be able to get through 3 or 4 movies before running out of juice: perfect for those boring, long-haul flights.
Check out the full article at PCPro to see how they configure the codec and player for maxium efficiency. Have a tip or trick for better media playback on a netbook? Let’s hear about it in the comments.
Posted by Nikos | Posted in General | Posted on 10-02-2010-05-2008
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Chip maker Broadcom has unveiled no fewer than three new mobile-themed hunks of silicon this week in preparation for MWC in just a few days’ time. You ready for this? Alright, first up we’ve got the catchily-named BCM20751, which performs the rather ordinary tasks of GPS, Bluetooth, and FM radio management but also throws in an audio processor to offload some work from the phone’s primary CPU, which the company says can reduce battery consumption enough to improve playback time by up to 100 percent in some situations. Next up, we’ve got the BCM4751, a GPS receiver that Broadcom’s confident is going to set a new benchmark for mobile location-based services; a complete setup takes less than 30 square millimeters of precious board space and is claimed to be a guru at picking up weak signals all the while sipping power. Finally, the BCM2049 supports Bluetooth 2.1+EDR, FM (both transmitting and receiving), and Bluetooth Low Energy — something that was recently adopted for standardization in Bluetooth 4.0. All three should be on display at the show next week. That’s not all, though — the company is also announcing comprehensive support for Android across much of its product range, which seems like a pretty prudent business decision all things considered.
Broadcom announces Android support, three-pack of chips to make your phones more awesome originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 10 Feb 2010 15:49:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Posted by Nikos | Posted in General | Posted on 07-11-2009-05-2008
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Safa is a Korean firm that has put out quite a few forgettable DAPs in its day, and while this one isn’t going to win any awards for technological advancement, it does look like “fun,” for whatever that’s worth. The Xing LED is a none-too-shabby 12mm thin and boasts 12 hours of playback time on a single charge. The company fails to mention little things like storage capacity and file format support, but that ain’t why we’re here: the face of the device features 27 LEDs that can be either programed to display the icon of your choice or used for a rousing game of Rock / Paper / Scissors. Sort of makes that Zune HD of yours look like overkill, eh? Price and availability yet to be announced.
[Via PMP Today]
Continue reading Safa Xing LED features MP3 playback, 27 pixel resolution
Filed under: Portable Audio
Safa Xing LED features MP3 playback, 27 pixel resolution originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 07 Nov 2009 04:44:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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